P/I/P Match 26: Revs vs ATX, Sat 9/2/23 7:30p [R]

Seems like Diego's been gone a long time. Can't be too many former pals still left on the team - Farrell, for sure. Bye and Jones maybe ...

 

I'd keep the center-back pairing as it is and start Farrell (if he's up to starting) at RB. I think Omar has played well enough and in the last two games, at least, has looked steadier than Farrell.

 

Moved to international duty thread

 

At 10 mins. at least Revs are taking shots, but Austin shows better passing & ball control, so far.

 

Revs gone sour from half to 67mins. Revs! Soccer 101! When heading the ball, head it to your own players!

At 85 mins., who told the Revs. that they could check out in the 2nd half and abandon the higher level of play they had during their 1st half? The honey pot is at the other end of the field at ATX goal instead of letting ATX dominate Revs. end of the field in 2nd half!

STUPID. JUST STUPID!

 

I don't have any stats to back this up but the Revs seem to have wasted a dozen quality opportunities already

 

Are we gonna blame Makoun for the tie? The refs? I think if they didn't waste so many chances, there's no discussion in a 3-2 win

 

Richie Williams sucks. 3 games, should have been 3 wims...he cant close out a game. Fire the runt

 

It was the players on the field who screwed this pooch, yet again. First half players did fine. Second half lack of quality of play was jeckle and hyde listless, at best. Volleying the ball to ATX end with 30 secs. +/- left in extra time was player moronic. They lost the lead on the field, not on the sidelines, IMHO.

 

Disappointing result. Sure, it wasn’t a loss but we were home against a feeling ‘out of the playoffs’ team that was bad on the road and giving up the most goals in the league.

too bad the revs couldn’t finish their opportunities. They clearly had the better run of play before going to their prevent defense.

not a good look for Makoun but the reality is that it was just a great shot by the Austin player….which unfortunately can make the difference in a soccer game.

Nacho Gil was my player of the game. The dude had tremendous hustle and energy all over the field.

 

I'm normally totally fine with ripping on refs, but I remember thinking that there would be four minutes of stoppage time before 3 was announced. Three seemed like a small number to me, and as they always say it is "a minimum of" - add to that the substitution in stoppage time, it is no surprise it went longer than the 3. So this one isn't on the refs. It is on the Revs for an inability to put the game away against a garbage team when they had plenty of attacking third possession and didn't do enough with it to get a 3rd goal. It is on the Revs for waiting too long to make initial substitutions and allowing Austin to start getting themselves into the game in the second half. And it is on the Revs for not taking the ball into the corner when there was about 30 second to go (WTF was Makoun thinking?).

So that's two wasted points. The Revs need to make up for it by getting some wins in the upcoming four games. The road is always tricky, but we need to figure out ways to take as many points as possible from the 3 game road swing and then Charlotte at home at the end of the month. The next four games are crucial because the last four will all be against teams we will be directly jockeying with for playoff seeding.

 

Agreed. Anytime there is a goal, substitution, injury, or PK during stoppage time the original estimate essentially goes 'out the window'.

 

The last 20 minutes or so reminded me of the Montreal game. We couldn't gain enough possession of the ball to see the game out. Williams did wait a little too long to sub, but I think the unit out there was capable of finding a 3rd goal and that, to me, was his mindset.

When he subs he typically swaps out the wings, but Chancalay and Nacho were both good, hence the reluctance to take them out. Chancalay looks like he's got a scorer's mentality similar to Bou's. He's looking to shoot, which is something the club needs right now. And last night he was the best player on the pitch.

They missed Polster, it turns out. I think having the extra (good) midfielder might have helped. Certainly Makoun wouldn't have been in the game. Football/soccer is a thinking man's sport and a lot of times you end up paying for brain farts like the one Makoun made.

It was a frustrating night, but I think you have to give the opponents a little credit. They built some momentum and kept pushing for the equalizer. All we had to do was open the door for them, which unfortunately we did.

 

William's in-game management so far has been poor.

 

I was ballistic at the ref at the end (watched this one on Apple/replay) at why there was a full extra minute, so I went back and rewatched the extra time. The Revs took 50 seconds for their double-sub in extra time and Austin scored at 3:48 of extra, so we really have no complaint with him.

Whether there was 3 minutes of extra time in the 2nd half, I don't know, but it didn't seem like there were many stoppages. I expected 2, to be honest.

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Makoun saw an opening, but it wasn't that big, he didn't hit it nearly well enough and, besides, WTF. I like the guy, but he screwed up big time. I'm sure he's going to happy to be joining Venezuela this week, instead of watching the tape of that one.

It also should be noted that DuJuan Jones failed to save a ball at the touchline that he managed to get to - and that also would have probably allowed them to kill the remaining time.

I hate the take-it-to-the-corner play, but if there ever was a proof-of-concept, this was it. Regardless, there's no reason we couldn't maintain possession and at least force Austin to come back and work to win the ball back.

It did seem like we started draining in momentum from the moment we took the lead. We seem to have a real problem playing with a lead - we almost always start to relax and are forced to defend, rather than punish a team that has to open up. I can't even remember the last time we extended a lead late against an opponent forced to desperation. Virtually every win we get is a product of surviving desperately defensively - it shouldn't be that way (and it wasn't in 2021, even when we had a lot of 1-goal wins).

Nacho was very good, as was Chancalay. I loved Chancalay's headed goal - that's how a real pro finishes a quality cross.

 

To be fair, Bruce's in-game management has not been stellar.

 

Not always, but there have been games where he hit all the right buttons with his subs.

 

I’m glad Jozy is no longer on the roster because I always wanted to puke when I saw him enter a game.

 

To be sure, that was some questionable decision-making by Bruce - maybe more hope than confidence?

OTOH, we felt that way about Omar last year too - but smart coaches realize that seasoned veterans go through ups and downs and usually bounce back. But, Jozy just felt like a bad fit style-wise; I think Arena felt like he could take advantage of some of Jozy's skills, but overall it was just a bad fit.